Truth fails not, but her outward forms that bear
The longest date do melt like frosty rime.
I
The fourth Christian century was far past its meridian, when, high
above the summit of the supreme peak of Caucasus, a magnificent eagle
came sailing on broad fans into the blue, and his shadow skimmed the
glittering snow as it had done day by day for thousands of years. A
human figure—or it might be superhuman, for his mien seemed more than
mortal—lifted from the crag, to which he hung suspended by massy gyves
and rivets, eyes mournful with the presentiment of pain. The eagle’s
screech clanged on the wind, as with outstretched neck he stooped
earthward in ever narrowing circles; his huge quills already creaked in
his victim’s ears, whose flesh crept and shrank, and involuntary
convulsions agitated his hands and feet. Then happened what all these
millenniums had never witnessed. No thunderbolt had blazed forth from
that dome of cloudless blue; no marksman had approached the
inaccessible spot; yet, without vestige of hurt, the eagle dropped
lifeless, falling sheer down into the unfathomable abyss below. At the
same moment the bonds of the captive snapped asunder, and, projected by
an impetus which kept him clear of the perpendicular precipice, he
alighted at an infinite depth on a sun-flecked greensward amid young
ash and oak, where he long lay deprived of sense and motion.
The sun fell, dew gathered on the grass, moonshine glimpsed through the
leaves, stars peeped timidly at the prostrate figure, which remained
prostrate and unconscious still. But as sunlight was born anew in the
East a thrill passed over the slumberer, and he became conscious, first
of an indescribably delicious feeling of restful ease, then of a
gnawing pang, acute as the beak of the eagle for which he at first
mistook it. But his wrists, though still encumbered with bonds and
trailing fetters, were otherwise at liberty, and eagle there was none.
Marvelling at his inward and invisible foe, he struggled to his feet,
and found himself contending with a faintness and dizziness heretofore
utterly unknown to him. He dimly felt himself in the midst of things
grown wonderful by estrangement and distance. No grass, no flower, no
leaf had met his eye for thousands of years, nothing but the
impenetrable azure, the transient cloud, sun, moon, and star, the
lightning flash, the glittering peaks of ice, and the solitary eagle.
There seemed more wonder in a blade of grass than in all these things,
but all was blotted in a dizzy swoon, and it needed his utmost effort
to understand that a light sound hard by, rapidly growing more
distinct, was indeed a footfall. With a violent effort he steadied
himself by grasping a tree, and had hardly accomplished so much when a
tall dark maiden, straight as an arrow, slim as an antelope, wildly
beautiful as a Dryad, but liker a Maenad with her aspect of mingled
disdain and dismay, and step hasty as of one pursuing or pursued,
suddenly checked her speed on perceiving him.
“Who art thou?” he exclaimed.
“Gods! Thou speakest Greek!”
“What else should I speak?”
“What else? From whom save thee, since I closed my father’s eyes, have
I heard the tongue of Homer and Plato?”
“Who is Homer? Who is Plato?”
The maiden regarded him with a look of the deepest astonishment.
“Surely,” she said, “thy gift has been bestowed upon thee to little
purpose. Say not, at least, that thou usest the speech of the Gods to
blaspheme them. Thou art surely yet a votary of Zeus?”
“I a votary of Zeus!” exclaimed the stranger. “By these fetters, no!”
And, weak as he was, the forest rang with his disdainful laughter.
“Farewell,” said the maiden, as with dilating form and kindling eye she
gathered up her robes. “I parley with thee no more. Thou art tenfold
more detestable than the howling mob down yonder, intent on rapine and
destruction. They know no better, and can no other. But thou, apt in
speaking the sacred tongue yet brutally ignorant of its treasures,
knowing the father of the Gods only to revile him! Let me pass.”
The stranger, if willing to hinder her, seemed little able. His eyes
closed, his limbs relaxed, and without a cry he sank senseless on the
sward.
In an instant the maiden was kneeling by his side. Hastily undoing a
basket she carried on her arm, she drew forth a leather flask, and,
supporting the sunken head with one hand, poured a stream of wine
through the lips with the other. As the gurgling purple coursed down
his throat the sufferer opened his eyes, and thanked her silently with
a smile of exquisite sweetness. Removing the large leaves which shaded
the contents of the basket, she disclosed ripe figs and pomegranates,
honeycomb and snow-white curd, lying close to each other in tempting
array. The stranger took of each alternately, and the basket was
well-nigh emptied ere his appetite seemed assuaged.
The observant maiden, meanwhile, felt her mood strangely altered.
“So have I imaged Ulysses to myself,” she thought as she gazed on the
stranger’s goodly form, full of vigour, though not without traces of
age, the massive brow, the kindly mouth, the expression of far-seeing
wisdom. “Such a man ignorant of letters, and a contemner of Zeus!”
The stranger’s eloquent thanks roused her from a reverie. The Greek
tongue fell upon her ear like the sweetest music, and she grieved when
its flow was interrupted by a question addressed directly to herself.
“Can a God feel hunger and thirst?”
“Surely no,” she rejoined.
“I should have said the same yesterday,” returned the stranger.
“Wherefore not to-day?”
“Dear maiden,” responded he, with winning voice and manner, “we must
know each other better ere my tale can gain credence with thee. Do thou
rather unfold what thine own speech has left dark to me. Why the
language of the Gods, as should seem, is here understood by thee and me
alone; what foes Zeus has here other than myself; what is the profane
crowd of which thou didst speak; and why, alone and defenceless, thou
ascendest this mountain. Think of me, if thou wilt, as one fallen from
the clouds.”
“Strange man,” returned the maiden, “who knowest Homer’s speech and not
Homer’s self, who renouncest Zeus and resemblest him, hear my tale ere
I require thine. Yesterday I should have called myself the last
priestess of Apollo in this fallen land, to-day I have neither shrine
nor altar. Moved by I know not what madness, my countrymen have long
ago forsaken the worship of the Gods. The temples crumbled into ruin,
prayer was no longer offered or sacrifice made as of old, the priestly
revenues were plundered; the sacred vessels carried away; the voice of
oracles became dumb; the divine tongue of Greece was forgotten, its
scrolls of wisdom mouldered unread, and the deluded people turned to
human mechanics and fishermen. One faithful servant of Apollo remained,
my father; but ’tis seven days since he closed his eyes for ever. It
was time, for yesternoon the heralds proclaimed by order of the King
that Zeus and the Olympians should be named no more in Caucasia.”
“Ha!” interrupted the stranger, “I see it all. Said I not so?” he
shouted, gazing into the sky as if his eye could pierce and his voice
reach beyond the drifting clouds. “But to thy own tale,” he added,
turning with a gesture of command to the astonished Elenko.
“It is soon told,” she said. “I knew that it was death to serve the
Gods any more, yet none the less in my little temple did fire burn upon
Apollo’s altar this morning. Scarcely was it kindled ere I became aware
of a ruffianly mob thronging to sack and spoil. I was ready for death,
but not at their hands. I caught up this basket, and escaped up the
mountain. On its inaccessible summit, it is reported, hangs Prometheus,
whom Zeus (let me bow in awe before his inscrutable counsels) doomed
for his benevolence to mankind. To him, as Aeschylus sings, Io of old
found her way, and from him received monition and knowledge of what
should come to pass. I will try if courage and some favouring God will
guide me to him; if not, I will die as near Heaven as I may attain.
Tell me on thy part what thou wilt, and let me depart. If thou art
indeed Zeus’s enemy, thou wilt find enough on thy side down yonder.”
“I have been Zeus’s enemy,” returned the stranger, mildly and gravely,
“I am so no longer. Immortal hate befits not the mortal I feel myself
to have become. Nor needest thou ascend the peak further. Maiden, I am
Prometheus!”